


Jonathan Sims & Trauma

by cronaisawriter



Series: Trauma/Abuse and Media [12]
Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Childhood Trauma, M/M, Meta, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Psychological Trauma
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-25
Updated: 2020-05-25
Packaged: 2021-03-02 22:13:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,427
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24374083
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cronaisawriter/pseuds/cronaisawriter
Summary: An Analysis of the trauma Jon has been through, the signs jon shows and the way the narrative uses trauma in the story.
Relationships: Basira Hussain & Melanie King & Alice "Daisy" Tonner & Jonathan Sims, Elias Bouchard & Jonathan "Jon" Sims | The Archivist, Jonah Magnus & Jonathan "Jon" Sims | The Archivist, Martin Blackwood/Jonathan "Jon" Sims | The Archivist
Series: Trauma/Abuse and Media [12]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1448578
Comments: 11
Kudos: 67





	Jonathan Sims & Trauma

**Author's Note:**

> CW: mention of self-harm, discussion of trauma and abuse

###  Traumas:

###  Childhood:

  1. Loss of father at age 2: Shock trauma in the first three years can easily cause attachment severance and can cause classical traumatization on top of this (PTSD)
  2. Loss of mother around the age of 4, this is early enough that it disrupts primary attachment formation.
  3. Feeling deeply unwanted by his grandmother: Even while loving her, he felt unwanted, causing attachment issues, losing his previous attachment figure in his mother can cause developmental regression if his mother offered a healthy connection. This is a complex traumatic experience and form of relational trauma. His identity and core beliefs may be altered by this. 
  4. Childhood Emotional neglect: Had all he needed to maintain health but his description shows she lacked an emotional connection to young Jon. CEN causes wide-ranging effects and causes poor self-regulation skills and emotional intelligence. 
  5. Emotional and physical bullying: often dismissed but is a form of abuse and is a form of relational trauma. 
  6. The Mr Spider book: An experience of general trauma and his first mark by The Web. All those touched by the entities are affected psychologically, especially the younger they are like Agnes or Julia. 



###  Adult:

  1. Emotional and psychological manipulation by Elias Bouchard| Jonah Magnus, complex chronic relational trauma, including the marking and choosing of The Eye
  2. The attack by Prentis causing physical trauma, group trauma and marking by the corruption
  3. Being on the run from a murder, complicated shock traumas. 
  4. Multiple physical assaults & severe injuries complicated shock traumas, Marking with The Desolation, The Spiral and The Vast
  5. Multiple kidnappings, one for more than a month, which caused chronic complex trauma and experience marks by The Hunt 
  6. The Unknowing a shock trauma with previous stresses before and the mark of The Stranger
  7. Experiencing a Coma and marking by The End 
  8. Transformation to The Archivist reinforces negative core beliefs and breaks any identity formation. 
  9. Loss of his friends to death and
  10. Repeated social-relational stressors and rupture
  11. Attacks by his friends physically and severed socially a relational trauma and marking of The Slaughter. 
  12. Exposure to The Dark: shock, trauma, and the complicated effects on the spiritual level. 
  13. Had his ribs ripped out of his body, which is physical trauma and is marked by The Flesh
  14. Entering The Buried: a chronic trauma
  15. Confrontation with Elias Boucahd| Jonah Magnus and Peter Lukas, gaining The Lonely's mark. 
  16. Starting the apocalypse
  17. Traversing the apocalypse 
  18. Multiple vicarious traumas in through his archive powers



Vicarious trauma experienced via the statements and watching others become injured and even killed An extreme version of the trauma, experienced reporters, first responders, content filters on sites like YouTube on those who study conflict. Jon has a deep experience of this every time he reads a statement, and then during the period of the apocalypse, he is experiencing near consistently. 

Paradoxically, Jon also becomes addicted to these experiences. Due to his archivist change, they become necessary for him to survive and not experience symptoms of withdrawal. Which parallels the addictive effects of trauma and the way the nervous system may become dependent on extreme stress. 

##  Signs of C-PTSD & Developmental Trauma:

  1. Addictions
  2. Agitation 
  3. Anger
  4. Anxiety attacks
  5. Avoids hurting others by shutting them out
  6. Cloaks fear in logic and scepticism for years
  7. Considered "mature for his age" as a child
  8. Compulsive behaviours
  9. A dependency of traumatic situations to function. Ex: “Do I miss being kidnapped?” 
  10. Difficulty naming and communication emotions Ex: “I feel sad” when Martin is asking for a more in-depth explanation 
  11. Difficulty concentrating
  12. Difficulty forming healthy attachments, often failing to trust others
  13. Dissociation-Trances after reading a statement after effect of vicarious trauma also experienced during apocalypse arc 
  14. Emotional dysregulation 
  15. Emotional flashbacks
  16. Executive Dysfunction
  17. Fatigue 
  18. Fears born from trauma Ex: Wanting to avoid the domain of the buried as well as spiders
  19. Feelings of isolation from others, his perception of himself
  20. Fixation with those who traumatized him
  21. Guilt 
  22. Hypervigilance 
  23. Hyperarousal 
  24. Insomnia 
  25. Interoception issues 
  26. Impulsivity
  27. Irritability 
  28. Isolation both physically and emotionally 
  29. Lacking emotional awareness 
  30. Locus of control issues, this doesn’t apply to all situations as control is a complex idea in TMA but still can be seen in how he places blame in situations
  31. Masking trauma in dry humour
  32. Negative affect
  33. Nightmares
  34. Obsessive thoughts We can see him obsessive over new things he learns
  35. Paranoia
  36. Physical signs of stress, multiple times being described as looking like hell, earlier Grey hair
  37. Preoccupation with trauma Ex: as a child, the weight of the Mr Spider incident brought him to the job
  38. Ruminations, spinning one thought over in his head
  39. Self describes himself as a "coward" which is a value judgment based on chronic feelings of fear
  40. Self-destructive tendencies Ex: Remove his ribs to help others and smoking
  41. Self Esteem Issues often views himself in a negative light and will put this on other people ex: Jon's derisive comments about Martin in the earlier seasons. 
  42. Severe boundary issues, either having impermeable boundaries or lacking them entirely
  43. Startle reflex heightened
  44. Struggles with self-care
  45. Struggles to combing emotional and cognitive empathy. 



##  Entity's Marks:

Jon is marked by the entities that happen during a trauma experience, being marked acts as a trauma. It causes shifts in how they interact with others, people marked having noticeable changes in behaviour from as dramatic as Melanie to comparatively minor changes in Georgie. Alterations in core beliefs and behaviour patterns caused by the marks are analogous to trauma's effects. Invisible scaring on the mind is how traumatic experiences function physiological and the marks are metaphysical versions. 

This relates to Jon's fourteen marks that altered him on the metaphysical level. Being marked makes individuals more likely to experience further danger due to now being useful to the fears, and in Jon's case, it became part of a plan of a different abusive party. The marks literally shape him into someone who can be used as a weapon of another party a severe loss of autonomy that mirrors abusive situations by those in high authority. 

##  The Job:

Like the whole archives staff, their previous trauma is what brought them there. Martin's psychological abuse, abandonment and his mother's illness, Tim's loss of his brother, Melanie's experience with The Slaughter, Daisy's experience with the hunt and Basira's experiences being sectioned and her relationship with Daisy. A lack of healthy attachment is a pattern in the staff. 

Jon's isolation and the subsequent effects of the vicarious trauma drive him further into an obsessive need for information. Having previous trauma also links to a tendency to experience more trauma. Elias Bouchad|Jonah Magnus relies on Jon's predisposition for re-traumatization in his plan for building The Archive. 

##  Relationships:

Every relationship in the show is mediated by group trauma. As mentioned above, The Archives attract traumatized and/or isolated individuals. Jon's trauma reactions of isolating, labelling and paranoid thoughts cause him more than anyone else to alienate others seen most explicitly in the early seasons. Tim specifically cannot stand Jon's decisions and has conflicting reactions to trauma. Jon's control issues cause a severe relational rupture with his colleagues.

His "addiction" issues in the consumption of trauma and identity issues cause later relational ruptures with others because it's a damaging habit. Georgie and Melanie are especially associated with him less after he gains avatar status, enhanced by Melanie's trauma with Elias Bouchard|Jonah Magnus & The Slaughter. 

Daisy and Martin form stronger bonds to Jon inversely to the others. Daisy and Jon connect after the shared experience in The Buried. Jon and Martin can't fully connect until Jon realizes how grounding Martin is for him and their shared experience with the Lonely. Martin learns boundaries throughout the story after early on having his own trauma cause him to lack the ability to stand up for himself, this allows their later relationship to flourish because he is able to make Jon think and not over put his trauma on martin. 

Basira is a complex case as she carries a straighter head on her shoulders than anyone else due to her reaction to appear hyper in control of the situation and have a plan to Jon's slapdash approach. They struggle with relational rupture easily but retain an ability to communicate better than many of his other relationships allowing them to be surprisingly functional. 

Elias|Jonah pushed Jon through multiple trauma’s using the effects (both metaphysical and psychological) to make him easier to manipulate and use. Even when Jon becomes aware of what is going on slowly he can never catch up to where Elias|Jonah is. They both fixate on each other to some extent making their relationship one that is interesting. 

  
  


**Author's Note:**

> Thoughts?


End file.
